A Devil's Dictionary

CRASH DIVE-3

I AM GONE, TOO. AT least, I am no longer in the cockpit. Instead, I awaken from a dream I cannot remember in a place I have never been—no, I can see now that is incorrect. I am home, still sequestered in the dingy sleeping quarters at the very back of the Temple—where I have remained now for three days without benefit of food or water, and where I shall stay—unto death, if necessary—until Rue Umbra shows me His face. Until He Who Created Everything bestows upon me the gift of His Holy visage.

“Master Hezekiah ... the Artifact is ready.”

“Bring it to me, Jocasta. I will view it here in my chambers.”

“Yes, Master.”

I rise and swing my legs out of bed, and am startled briefly by my reflection in the bureau mirror. For it seems at first that I am someone—something—else; someone/something alien, with a gray, rumpled body and a face that is smooth like glass. Then it is gone and I see only myself: the green scales, the angled brow, the tired eyes of the High Priest of Samara.

At length Jocasta re-enters the room and places the box on the rug at my feet. “It is my hope—our hope, Master, the entire congregation’s—that you will end your fast soon. May Rue Umbra light your way.”

He moves to leave but hesitates, pausing in the doorway. “It is also hoped ... that you will be careful. This so-called Artifact—it is not of this world.”

Then he is gone and I am alone with the box, the box containing the meteor which has somehow survived its entry into our atmosphere. The hollow meteor with the strange runes printed on its surface (at least, that is how it has been described to me). The thing whose existence is responsible for my crisis of faith.

Show me, Oh Highest One. Send me a sign. Reveal to me, your faithful servant, the n***d face of God.

But Rue Umbra is silent as I open the box and lift out the Artifact, and proceed to examine it by the dim light of the candles. Nor is the object so unfathomable as I’d presumed: for it is clearly something designed to protect the head, similar in many respects to our Centurions’ helmets (although charred and blackened from its journey through the atmosphere) and composed of materials I have never seen; some of which glow at the touch of my fingers and cause the Artifact to hum and to vibrate ...

Show me your face, Oh Lord, so that I may believe again!

But in the end there is nothing, only silence, as a glassy shield lowers smoothly and locks into place. As I stare into its curved, indigo-blue surface—which has become a kind of looking glass, a mirror—and see only myself, Hezekiah. Only the High Priest of Samara laid low by his fast.

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* * * *

SOMETHING IS WRONG. This much is clear as I stir from the vision and find the diver shaking—shaking as though it might fly apart any moment. Zebra One, meanwhile, is talking at me through my headset:

... get it back. We’re trying ... but ... long shot. Repeat: we have ... return mirror. It’s just ...

Again, damn you! You’re breaking up. What about the mirror?

... has failed. We are trying—

But they are gone—and I am alone. Alone against the ergosphere, whose end must surely be near. Alone—in light of the mirror’s failure— against the event horizon, beyond which lies Hell itself.

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* * * *

I PAUSE, FEELING IT again. As though someone were in the cave with me, as though someone were watching.

I look to the mouth of the cavern, beyond which the snow continues to fall. No, it is nothing—the wind, perhaps, coursing through the opening.

I return to my work, continuing the stroke which will complete our leader (his snout blue with war paint, his shoulders broad and hairy), knowing he will be pleased. For I have captured him in truth—as well as the spirit of his hunt—captured him so that he might live for all time. And yet, as the winds moan and the torches falter, the feeling I am not alone persists, so that I again look to the door of the cave, and this time—someone is there.

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